Developed for PC and Mac and published in North America
by Aspyr, Star Wars The Force Unleashed: Ultimate Sith Edition combines the
original Star Wars The Force Unleashed videogame with three new levels set in
iconic Star Wars locales and a host of new costumes and character models. This
special edition of the game will show players the deepest, darkest side of the
Force in a story that puts them on a collision course with Luke Skywalker
himself.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed completely re-imagines the scope and scale of the
Force and casts players as Darth Vaderís ďSecret Apprentice,Ē unveiling new
revelations about the Star Wars galaxy seen through the eyes of this mysterious
new character, who is armed with unprecedented powers. Originally released on
multiple platforms in September 2008, the game quickly became the
fastest-selling Star Wars game ever, and has since sold six million units
worldwide.

Eidos published Deus Ex and was/is a potential publisher for Spector's/Smith's future titles.

B) And? How does that lead to you reading their minds?

Little thing called common sense. People who want fruitful careers tend not to say anything that would hurt their reputation. Blaming the failure of a game on a publisher doesn't help your chances of landing future deals with said publisher or others.

C) again, and?

Insulting your target audience (console gamers) is not conducive to sales. Cliffy B had no problem calling PC gamers a bunch of pirates because PC gamers aren't his target audience anymore. Conversely, calling console gamers a bunch of retards with low standards and short attention spans would be unwise, given that console gamers are the primary demographic these days.

They were completely blunt and candid about everything about the game, going as far as other employees specifically blaming others in the company for the various design mistakes.

Did they blame anyone at Eidos? After all, it was Eidos that forced them to design the game for the Xbox.

Even though they have no financial motivators or other reasons to do so and their employer was defunct.

Eidos was not defunct and Eidos is the company that funded the game.

They even readily acknowledged the console limitations placed on them for map making and the problems it caused.

Doesn't that support my argument..? You said that being designed for consoles had nothing to do with the game being shitty but apparently Smith and Spector disagree.

A) Eidos (the publisher) is still around.B) Warren Spector and Harvey Smith are still in the games industry.C) The console market is still very relevant.

A) Eidos does not publish any titles for either of themB) And? How does that lead to you reading their minds?C) again, and?

They were completely blunt and candid about everything about the game, going as far as other employees specifically blaming others in the company for the various design mistakes. But somehow they just decided to lie about this one thing, right? Even though they have no financial motivators or other reasons to do so and their employer was defunct.

Occam's Razor son. There was no PR department filtering their comments and they had no reason to lie. They even readily acknowledged the console limitations placed on them for map making and the problems it caused. They already "dissed" consoles, they had no reason to lie and you are SERIOUSLY CLAIMING TO BE A MINDREADER. Think about that. You think you know more than the MAKERS OF THE GAME? That's some arrogance right there.

All of which might matter if they hadn't given that information in A) a post mortem B) after the developing company was kapuut and C) both makers of the game said it. Try again. Yeah sure they were just trying to save face 2 years after the fact

I think you forgot that:

A) Eidos (the publisher) is still around.B) Warren Spector and Harvey Smith are still in the games industry.C) The console market is still very relevant.

Yeah, Spector and Smith are really going to say "DX2 sucked because Eidos forced us to design it for consoles and for an audience we didn't think could handle the RPG elements and ammo management." I mean, it's not like saying that would have any impact on their future career opportunities with Eidos or other publishers in a console-driven industry.

You must be incredibly naive. Why would developers be any more credible than anyone else? They still have NDAs, they still have to answer to bosses, they still have to bend to the whims of publishers. Anybody with a career isn't going to publicly state anything that endangers that career.

All of which might matter if they hadn't given that information in A) a post mortem B) after the developing company was kapuut and C) both makers of the game said it. Try again. Yeah sure they were just trying to save face 2 years after the fact

Wake up little man, the black helicopters are circling outside your home. Time to lock yourself in the panic room, the gaming industry is out to get you bastard PC gamers!

Pretty much discounted everything else you said after you seriously claimed that every game dev from all of those series are a bunch of liars.

You must be incredibly naive. Why would developers be any more credible than anyone else? They still have NDAs, they still have to answer to bosses, they still have to bend to the whims of publishers. Anybody with a career isn't going to publicly state anything that endangers that career.

Remember when some artist on FEAR2 claimed that FEAR2 had no lead SKU? Here's a link: http://www.ps3center.net/news/2051/ps3-version-of-fear-2-will-not-be-a-port/. I'm guessing you actually believed that? Or better yet, what do you think Bioware would say if you asked them about the retarded marketing of Dragon Age? Do you honestly think they'd admit that EA was concerned about the game's mass appeal, hence the focus on sex and violence in all the ads and trailers? Of course they wouldn't.

If you have a career, you will never be completely honest to the public unless:

A) You're retired.B) The people you're criticizing are no longer relevant.C) You're stupid.

Open your eyes, little man. Game development is a business like any other.

I doubt the devs would come out and say "Well, we thought console gamers were dumb so we stripped out all the complicated stuff." Probably not good for their reputation.

Pretty much discounted everything else you said after you seriously claimed that every game dev from all of those series are a bunch of liars. Seriously you are one paranoid and delusional little person. Jerykk knows the minds of game developers better than they do everyone, just FYI. Go-to guy for the gaming industry in this thread!

Given that they themselves actually said "we found the inventory and biomod management tedious" I disagree.

I doubt the devs would come out and say "Well, we thought console gamers were dumb so we stripped out all the complicated stuff." Probably not good for their reputation.

GRAW is their attempt at relating to more people both with a more modern storyline and gameplay mechanics. None of which has anything to do with consoles.

Consoles = larger, more casual audience with generally shorter attention spans. That's why GRAW is less tactical and more action-oriented and has so many player assists.

No they aren't. Consoles and bigger audiences are synonymous.

Bigger audience = mainstream audience. The audience for tactical shooters is not mainstream. The audience for GRAW and R6V are mainstream, hence the focus on accessibility and the removal of the more tactical elements.

It doesn't get more literal than from the mouths of the developers chum.

Ah, yes, because all interviews and diaries are perfectly blunt and honest, especially when filtered through PR, marketing and the general interest of keeping a job in this console-driven industry.

Here are the facts: Your argument is based on the assumption that all these games would have turned out as they did regardless of consoles. My argument is based on the fact that they did turn out the way they did as soon as they transitioned to consoles. History has repeatedly shown that PC games that become console games get dumbed down. Whether this is a result of console limitations or an attempt to appeal to console audiences is completely irrelevant.

Yeah, I've read that. It's possible that they would have still made these decisions had PC been the only SKU. However, given that the game was designed for the Xbox, it's very likely that they made their design decisions with the console audience in mind.

Given that they themselves actually said "we found the inventory and biomod management tedious" I disagree. Do you know more than the makers of the game about their own game and intentions? DX2 was a shitty followup because they made it a shitty game, they didn't understand what people loved about the first one.

It also got rid of the rope arrow.

This just sounds petty and whiny at this point.

GRAW is less realistic and far more scripted than its predecessors. Then you also have the third-person perspective and the ridiculous enemy highlighting. Attempts to cater to a broader audience? Sure. But as I said, consoles and mainstream audiences are synonymous.

GRAW is their attempt at relating to more people both with a more modern storyline and gameplay mechanics. None of which has anything to do with consoles. GR1 was not exactly the pinnacle of dynamic combat, the entire game was ridiculously scripted to a T. I loved GR1 and know a lot more about it than you do, I'm surprised you'd even bring it up. I helped mod for that game, I know all about it's strengths and weaknesses.

Again, consoles and mainstream audiences are synonymous.

No they aren't. Consoles and bigger audiences are synonymous.

You obviously can't dumb down a game that was never on the PC. Shooters have been dumbed down since consoles became the lead SKU, as have RPGs. Platformers, fighting games, arcadey racing games, etc, haven't because they were never PC genres to begin with.

You have taken several series where the creators themselves basically sabotaged their own work or that had design team/studio switches and then tried to draw a line to consoles as the blame factor. I've seen nothing convincing from you other than "welp I think theyre dumber and thats my opinion". You also seem to think you know more than some of the guys who made the games which is pretty amusing. It doesn't get more literal than from the mouths of the developers chum.

DX2's shittiness has everything to do with conscious design decisions from the team and very little to do with consoles.

Yeah and that's why the interface was clearly designed for gamepads and the levels were clearly designed with the limited memory of the Xbox in mind...

They've said in interviews many times that they went with universal ammo and many other stupid decisions because they thought people didn't enjoy those aspects of DX1.

Yeah, I've read that. It's possible that they would have still made these decisions had PC been the only SKU. However, given that the game was designed for the Xbox, it's very likely that they made their design decisions with the console audience in mind.

Likewise with Thief, Thief 3 was an excellent title. The only thing really hampering it was the level loading due to limited memory.

Of all the PC-to-console series, I'll agree that Thief 3 suffered the least. However, it still suffered from the memory constraints of consoles. It also got rid of the rope arrow.

Ghost Recon I don't think you can make that claim. The first iteration was buggy as hell and the design team said they wanted to focus more on urban environments as the cold war was largely dead and forgotten (the basis of GR1 is a mostly CW/Post-USSR inspired story). I don't particularly care for the new direction but I think it's dishonest to blame it on consoles.

GRAW is less realistic and far more scripted than its predecessors. Then you also have the third-person perspective and the ridiculous enemy highlighting. Attempts to cater to a broader audience? Sure. But as I said, consoles and mainstream audiences are synonymous.

Rainbow Six - the games were never selling billions and there's only so much you can do with their old idea of using the tactical overhead map and watching the action. Clancy's license team said they wanted more excitement and less SWAT style gameplay. They got what they wanted, for better or worse.

Again, consoles and mainstream audiences are synonymous.

Commandos - hahaha is this a joke?

Not at all. Commandos 3 was designed for the Xbox. It had smaller, less interactive environments, fewer characters and arbitrary methods of making the game more intense (like respawning enemies and time limits). It also had a god-awful interface designed for gamepads. Commandos 4 (Strike Force) was turned into a plain shooter where you only control three characters.

You can assume that all these games would have followed this direction regardless of consoles but the fact is that they only changed (for the worse) once consoles became the focus.

You made your own list, I noticed someone else made their list too and you ignored it.

Which list? For what it's worth, I did say this: Of course, this isn't to say that I don't enjoy console games. I love the Prince of Persia and Tomb Raider games. The Splinter Cell games (well, 1 and 3) were awesome. I like most of the NFS games too. I even enjoyed Oblivion, Fallout 3, Jade Empire and Mass Effect as well, despite their many flaws. Mirror's Edge was great, Bioshock and Dead Space were pretty good. Beyond Good & Evil is one of my favorites. However, I think all these games would have been much better if they were designed specifically for PC gamers (though my favorite NFS games were essentially designed specifically for the PC).

You probably didn't read that, though. Keep in mind that "dumbed down" only refers to series or genres that were once PC and are now console. You obviously can't dumb down a game that was never on the PC. Shooters have been dumbed down since consoles became the lead SKU, as have RPGs. Platformers, fighting games, arcadey racing games, etc, haven't because they were never PC genres to begin with.

Or maybe stop complaining about games you hate and find something you might like? Gosh I sure do hate that Deus Ex 2 five year old game, I'm gonna hurrf durrf about it in this unrelated topic *chuckles and eats Doritos while flakes fall onto neckbeard*!

This debate is about the dumbing down of games because of consoles. DX2 is the pinnacle of that.

That's a pretty weak argument. I loved Deus Ex. I think it's one of the best games of all time. DX2 was an utter travesty and a slap in the face to all the DX fans. There's simply no excuse for DX2's shittiness, especially not "well, you don't have to play it!"

DX2's shittiness has everything to do with conscious design decisions from the team and very little to do with consoles. You must be utterly retarded if you think this game wouldn't be a travesty even without the console SKU. About the only thing gained would have been levels with less loading. They've said in interviews many times that they went with universal ammo and many other stupid decisions because they thought people didn't enjoy those aspects of DX1. They were utterly clueless about why DX1 was such a success, it totally blind sided them. They didn't get that the RPG aspects and depth made DX, not the FPS gameplay mechanics themselves which were pretty clunky to begin with.

Likewise with Thief, Thief 3 was an excellent title. The only thing really hampering it was the level loading due to limited memory.

Ghost Recon I don't think you can make that claim. The first iteration was buggy as hell and the design team said they wanted to focus more on urban environments as the cold war was largely dead and forgotten (the basis of GR1 is a mostly CW/Post-USSR inspired story). I don't particularly care for the new direction but I think it's dishonest to blame it on consoles.

Rainbow Six - the games were never selling billions and there's only so much you can do with their old idea of using the tactical overhead map and watching the action. Clancy's license team said they wanted more excitement and less SWAT style gameplay. They got what they wanted, for better or worse.

Commandos - hahaha is this a joke?

You made your own list, I noticed someone else made their list too and you ignored it. I think the message was pretty clear, if you want deep gameplay experiences then they do exist on the console. Stop harping about what you can't play and maybe look for something to play. I don't actually expect you to do so, I know you're about as open minded as a Texas Republican but the fact remains you asked, people answered and you ignored.

We should turn all games into Imagine BabieZ and hey, if you don't like it, don't play it!

Or maybe stop complaining about games you hate and find something you might like? Gosh I sure do hate that Deus Ex 2 five year old game, I'm gonna hurrf durrf about it in this unrelated topic *chuckles and eats Doritos while flakes fall onto neckbeard*!

At first I thought this generation would be different from before at the end, when PC gaming usually leaps ahead of console gaming.

It takes people designing games for the PC high end for that to happen though. Who is still doing so? Even Crytek recently decided to abandon you guys. No one is terribly interested in the high end right now and graphics evolution has slowed to a crawl. Not really sure where this leap is coming from this time around. You've always had Carmack, Crytek and other companies pushing that sort of thing in the past. Now you have....? Valve I guess? Blizzard isn't exactly high end.

I think you can point to specific games or franchises that are now less than what they were but I think that's more to due technological limitations than the intelligence of the audience.

Technological limitations, I agree with. Designing a game around a mouse and keyboard provides a lot of options that gamepads don't. Designing a game for a system with superior hardware also opens up more opportunities. As for the intelligence of console gamers, I don't think they're stupid. I just think they have really low standards, which is why games like The Force Unleashed and Assassin's Creed sell so well. The PC has games like WoW and Sims but those appeal to a casual audience, whereas TFU and AC would be considered "hardcore" games.

In any case, whenever a PC series has been turned into a console series, the resulting games have always been simpler, shallower and less challenging than their PC predecessors. Whether this is due to console limitations or lower standards is largely irrelevant, as console gaming is pretty much synonymous with mainstream audiences.

Of course, this isn't to say that I don't enjoy console games. I love the Prince of Persia and Tomb Raider games. The Splinter Cell games (well, 1 and 3) were awesome. I like most of the NFS games too. I even enjoyed Oblivion, Fallout 3, Jade Empire and Mass Effect as well, despite their many flaws. Mirror's Edge was great, Bioshock and Dead Space were pretty good. Beyond Good & Evil is one of my favorites. However, I think all these games would have been much better if they were designed specifically for PC gamers (though my favorite NFS games were essentially designed specifically for the PC).

Likewise if Deus Ex 2 bothered you then no one is forcing you to play it.

That's a pretty weak argument. I loved Deus Ex. I think it's one of the best games of all time. DX2 was an utter travesty and a slap in the face to all the DX fans. There's simply no excuse for DX2's shittiness, especially not "well, you don't have to play it!"

Well visual quality is obviously subjective but I'll just say that I've played plenty of games on the PC that don't measure to Infamous in that department. I find most consoles to be fine graphically except the Wii, it's usually a case of limited video memory that causes problems. As ram prices have decreased to ridiculously low levels and even moreso for volume customers, I don't think it'll be as much of a problem next generation. If you asked me what I thought of consoles in the PS2/Xbox/Dreamcast days I would not have nice things to say

Oh I agree the gap is a lot lower now... that's one of the reasons console gaming is dominating more and more. I don't think the gap will ever close though.

At first I thought this generation would be different from before at the end, when PC gaming usually leaps ahead of console gaming. I thought this time games would look mostly the same on both platforms for the entire generation. With Left 4 Dead and Mirror's Edge though, I changed my mind... those games were fundementally better on PC in many ways. With Dragon Age and Rage and others coming, I think the gap will widen. Which isn't to say it will be AS wide as before, even in the last year of the 360, but it will be significant. I was teetering on the brink of "going console" for good myself, until I played the Xbox 360 Left 4 Dead demo, then the PC version... vastly superior on PC.

But in essence I agree the differences this generation are smaller.

As for Infamous, the design and animation was great, I just found the complete lack of AA and AF, and the poor draw distance and blurry overuse of depth of field, to be distracting and rather ugly. On a fundemental level it did look great, but as a life-long PC gamer I have trouble dealing with such things I guess.

Well visual quality is obviously subjective but I'll just say that I've played plenty of games on the PC that don't measure to Infamous in that department. I find most consoles to be fine graphically except the Wii, it's usually a case of limited video memory that causes problems. As ram prices have decreased to ridiculously low levels and even moreso for volume customers, I don't think it'll be as much of a problem next generation. If you asked me what I thought of consoles in the PS2/Xbox/Dreamcast days I would not have nice things to say

Infamous - I took a trip for a wedding and my local family there put me up, they had a Playstation 3. I was really surprised how great the graphics were and the parkour/combat were well done. It wasn't quite the fun I had with Prototype but it was fun in it's own way.

I thought Infamous was pretty ugly, visually. I have it for my PS3, enjoyed it, but the whole time I played it I was cursing the (in my opinion) horrible graphics. Some higher settings on a PC would have done wonders for that game, like mouse control would have done wonders for Killzone 2. I really wish Sony was multiplatform.

As for consoles dumbing down games, it has nothing to do with consoles themselves, but the mass market they bring to the table. If PC was the only way to play games and you needed 5 million sales to profit on a game, the exact same dumbing down would occur. In any medium, anywhere, the mass market stuff is more simple and accessible. It's just the way things work...

When gaming was a smaller hobby, like comic books or table-top RPGs, it got away with a lot more complexity.

I've been kind of warming up to consoles recently after playing them at friends places. I don't really see the dumbing down to be honest. I think you can point to specific games or franchises that are now less than what they were but I think that's more to due technological limitations than the intelligence of the audience. When I want a deep game to play, I just choose to play one. You don't need to play Halo and wrestling games if you don't want to. Likewise if Deus Ex 2 bothered you then no one is forcing you to play it.

Here's some examples of the console games I've enjoyed in the past few months. It's restricted to what my buddy owns since I don't have one myself.

Dead Rising - Great little zombie survival game. Graphically it's good, the gameplay depth is outstanding and the storyline is alright for a Japanese localized game. You're stuck in a massive mall, your player is a reporter trying to survive and discover what happened. It's also a game built from the ground up with replay in mind which I appreciated.

Saints Row 2 - I was shocked at how good this little game was. When I heard rap music in the intro I groaned but after watching my friend play for 30 minutes I was sold. It's another open world sandbox type title in the same style of Grand Theft Auto but much deeper than any GTA game I've played. I've heard there's a PC version but I've never seen it in stores and people don't say kind things about the port on here.

Tales of Vesperia - Let me preface this by saying I hate anime and JRPGs. This game still grabbed me somehow. It's JRPG through and through but the game has a ridiculous amount of depth and replay value. The storyline manages to break a lot of the usual JRPG cliches and there's even some genuine humor to be found. If more JRPGs were like this then I'd play less western style RPGs.

Infamous - I took a trip for a wedding and my local family there put me up, they had a Playstation 3. I was really surprised how great the graphics were and the parkour/combat were well done. It wasn't quite the fun I had with Prototype but it was fun in it's own way.

Battlefield 1943 - I went into this one expecting to hate it. In fact I hated it before I even played it just because I heard they removed some features that were in BF1942 which is one of my favorite games of all time. Surprisingly they removed mostly the crap I didn't really need in the first place. I had a lot of fun playing this on Xbox Live and the XBL experience in general was pretty good despite hearing many negative things about it from other PC gamers.

My friends have started to tease me about just getting a console of my own because I spend so much time playing theirs. I'm hesitant, I'm a PC gamer at heart but I must admit that there are fun and comparable experiences to games I've enjoyed on the PC. Sure there's a ton of shit on consoles but hell there's a ton of shit on PCs I don't like either.